Curse

Mercury Angel · May 03, 2006, 08:50 PM // 20:50

For the first time, I'm under -assault- by the spam filter.
If I typed these 2 lines, the above, and this one...

My second line would be suppressed.
And third.
And fourth.
And fifth.

It's downright awful.

I was typing full lines of text, rather than spamming short 2-4 word messages, and it still did it. I tried waiting longer, and it STILL suppressed me. It seems that I have to wait ~10 seconds after each message to say anything else.

What really makes it frustrating is that suppressed messages count towards future suppressed messages. So, if you get a message suppressed, you have to wait until a certain amount of time after your last try to get it sent out.

It makes having a conversation with somebody who -isn't- being suppressed a real pain.

After a bit of experimenting, it seems that it only gets bad after the first time you're suppressed. Then, you have to wait a while before it stops suppressing you so often.

The problem is, while it's not bad for the most part, if you DO manage to trigger it accidentally, prepare to be silent for 10-15 seconds, unable to convey why you're not responding to whoever you're talking to.
Either that, or you have to leave the town/outpost.

Maybe I'm just lucky (or unlucky, as it were), and I'm sure anyone who hasn't experienced this particular frustration is going to assume it's my fault;
I was talking in a fairly normal conversation using complete sentences, proper punctuation, and on-and-off proper capitalization (sometimes, I neglect it at the start of sentences, but the point remains). It was hardly at a rate which people would call 'spamming'.

And yet, I managed to trigger the filter. And after the first time, it happened again, and again, and again, and I couldn't understand why, or what was going on.

There was no warning. No pop-up message explaining how to avoid it, or what was going on. No update notes for the new builds explaining it.

I think I deserve a right to a little ire over this. And if your conversation had suddenly been squelched like that, I think you'd be frustrated too.

My suggestion;
Post the update notes for these past new builds for Guild Wars and EXPLAIN it. PLEASE. There's absolutely no justification for not putting this in the update notes, or neglecting to do them entirely for the past few days anyway.

Edit:
Sample of it. I'll try frapsing it later.

Though you can't see the first 2, I sent a friend 4 messages, all typed out as I sent them, of complete sentences, including punctuation and spelling, which slow it down minimally, but nevertheless slow it down.

The second message was squelched both times.

And as a note, I made the lines up as I went. There was no rehearsal of what to say. I didn't practice typing them in order to get a better typing speed. They came out fairly naturally, at as natural a speed as I could emulate for a test.

And to reiterate, I've played with it, and know how to avoid it at this point. The problem was that I -didn't- before. And I'm sure I'm not the only player who's encountered this.

Rogier · May 03, 2006, 08:55 PM // 20:55

i've experienced it, even with private chat! but somehow it doesn't botter me that much anymore, i usely don't say things that often, but i have seen it

thrice · May 03, 2006, 08:59 PM // 20:59

Yeah that happened to me last night too. /signed for fixing whatevers doing it and posting update notes.

Lasher Dragon · May 03, 2006, 09:17 PM // 21:17

/signed, something needs to be done.

What I don't understand is the people who are obviously using macros to spam their WTS messages seem unaffected by the excess-messaging filter. You know who I am talking about, the people who have consecutive numbers following their messages.

Evilsod · May 03, 2006, 09:21 PM // 21:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lasher Dragon

/signed, something needs to be done.

What I don't understand is the people who are obviously using macros to spam their WTS messages seem unaffected by the excess-messaging filter. You know who I am talking about, the people who have consecutive numbers following their messages.

All i can say is Anet really have a shit spam filter when somet like that gets round it so easily. I really don't see how changing the last number of a phrase lets you spam all you want, where as talking normally gets you blocked? I never realised it had started been done on Whispers though.... that really is f*cking stupid.

Undivine · May 03, 2006, 09:39 PM // 21:39

They could easily make it so that it supresses spam properly with a few simple rules:

Is it a macro used within 5 seconds of itself?
Is it 10 characters or less used within 2 seconds of the last output? (Allow 1, then block the second consecutive output like this.)
Is it an emote that the user has already used within the last 5 seconds?

Things like that. At the moment the spam filter simply seems to just supress anything that you say within 2 seconds of the last thing you said, or thereabouts. And then, yeah, it counts that blocked event as an output.

Ira Blinks · May 03, 2006, 10:39 PM // 22:39

Easy solution:

1) remove server controlled spam filter (except maybe for messages that go faster than once a second for performance sake)

2) remove limit from ignore list

3) notify blocked user as "<Such and such> added you to his ignore list"

Replicant · May 03, 2006, 10:50 PM // 22:50

/signed

just tried to spam myself with "hello" and got this message. had a friend try to spam me and he had no problem spamming me with "ROFL". I tried to spam him with "ROFL" and i got the surpressed message message.

He was on factions, i was on Prophecies at the time.. maybe that has something to do with it.

Hunter Sharparrow · May 03, 2006, 11:47 PM // 23:47

You guys are just getting this now? I've had that since I bought the game. It only happens when I say the same thing twice the exact same way and adding different numbers or multiple periods wouldn't work. Never could figure out how people could spam the exact same message so fast.

Example

WTS Sword
WTS Sword..... (blocked)
wts sword............ (blocked)
WtS sWoRd (blocked)
Want to sell sword (not blocked)

Replace the periods with random numbers and it still would get blocked. So to keep a message up on the screen when the text is going quick I would have to alternate between the first and last line I typed above. The time it takes to type the same message again and not have it suppressed is the time it takes for your message to fade if left on the screen when noone else is typing.

I've went into my options and took off the chat filters but all that did was get rid of the annoying sensorship of what is being said.

I get it for both factions and prophecies. Always have.

Tarun · May 04, 2006, 02:55 AM // 02:55

/signed

DarkGanni · May 04, 2006, 02:56 AM // 02:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Replicant

/signed

just tried to spam myself with "hello" and got this message. had a friend try to spam me and he had no problem spamming me with "ROFL". I tried to spam him with "ROFL" and i got the surpressed message message.

He was on factions, i was on Prophecies at the time.. maybe that has something to do with it.

Happened Same thing to me, except that we were both in prophecies.

/signed. Something has to be done about this and the ignore list isnt big enough.

The Fox · May 04, 2006, 07:25 AM // 07:25

Let's examine why the chat feature exists in game

1.) to communicate and make this a cooperative game where you get to interact with live people.

Now, lets examine why this "successive messaging filter" exists.

1.) People spam to annoy people just for the evilness of it.
2.) People spam to sell or buy their goods.
3.) People spam to sell or buy a service (running).

From this one can see the need for this filter in public chat that is overloaded with people communication in the wrong chat window. I appreciate any WTB/WTS messages that are removed from the public chat (though it's debatable if it's effective at all).

Now for my constructive criticism. The filter should NOT apply to guild chat/ whispters BECAUSE there is no need to have them supressing excessive messages of people abusing the wrong chat window. If this was to happen in a guild they would soon find themselves without a home, and if this was to happen in private chat they would be easily blocked. My guild is quite irriated that COMMUNICATION, which is essencial to a fun gaming experience, is being hampered by this latest update.

Please remove the surpression of messages from the guild chat and private chat. Thanks!

kvndoom · May 04, 2006, 10:36 AM // 10:36

It USED to only affect Local and Trade chat.

I was rubbing my head in confusion the other day when my GUILD chat messages were getting supressed. Why would I spam my own guild? They'd just tell me to shut the WTFBBQGOREDENGINEGO up.

Laibeus Lord · May 04, 2006, 11:10 AM // 11:10

They improved it but rather over-improved it

It's getting annoying

especially when you mis-chan

Oberon Shadowking · May 04, 2006, 01:23 PM // 13:23

OK, so WHAT THE HECK!

I am casually PMing with my friend last night, and all of a sudden, I start getting "excessive messaging" errors, and my chats are blocked! ALL of a sudden, I am restricted in the same way I am on the Local and Trade channels! This is extremely annoying, as I type fast and say a lot.

Does anyone know what's up with this? Was this part of the undocumented Tuesday Update?

Corinthian · May 04, 2006, 01:24 PM // 13:24

Try typing longer sentences or get Teamspeak.

fiery · May 04, 2006, 01:37 PM // 13:37

It's to stop annoying people who would spam someone constantly, just like an annoying person spamming all chat, trader chat, etc.

NinjaKai · May 04, 2006, 01:40 PM // 13:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by fiery

It's to stop annoying people who would spam someone constantly, just like an annoying person spamming all chat, trader chat, etc.

Incorrect it shouldn't be effecting the whisp system. It is a bug.

Hunter Sharparrow · May 04, 2006, 01:47 PM // 13:47

The way I see it is that people took something as simple as the chat and abused it (spams). So anet had to do something to correct this abusiveness yet again. Despite the changes by anet to correct the misbehaviors of players, players continue to look for exploits and parts of the game that can be abused for whatever the reason. Here's an idea, STOP.

I really don't understand why people would spam the WTS or WTB so often anyway. Players are always coming and going in and out of every town but not as fast as people are throwing out the ads. I've found it much more effective and a whole lot less boring to just throw out the WTS or WTB when ever you first enter a town and again right before you leave. I do this while playing the game and what this does is two things. First, I don't get bored just sitting in town and; second, I am putting out an add to almost a whole new group of people which increases my chances of making a successful trade.

There really is no need to be spamming the same message over and over with maybe one exception and that being the message LFG. However even then it is better to wait 5 minutes so you have a more refreshed populous in that district. The chat filter is good.

fiery · May 04, 2006, 01:51 PM // 13:51

Doubt it's a bug if it was incoporated to stop spamming due to people messaging one person to annoy, or to complain, and lessens the usage of the ignore list seeing the person can't flood your screen with whispers.